UPDATE: Some people are sending me emails about consecrations. Thanks, but sorry. I want them posted here and I am not going to do that work. I have enough to do.
Register.. get approved… post.
____
I have been hearing numerous reports that bishops have been consecrating the dioceses entrusted to their care to the protection of the Blessed Virgin Mary.
May I ask your help in assembling a list of those dioceses?
Please post in the combox.
Many these days feel a little helpless as the lib Steamroller of Ambiguity squishes sickeningly forward, reducing clarity to an amorphous goo of permissive self-justification.
What can we do?
Feel helpless no longer.
You have at your disposal – 24/7 – powerful arms against the Enemy and their worldly agents.
PRAY… PRAY… PRAY!
Powerful is the Most Holy Rosary.
Powerful are your petitions at Holy Mass.
Powerful are your mortifications and reparations for sin.
We have to think long term.
We should bring back as soon as possible and in as many places as possible the traditional “Leonine Prayers” after Mass.
We should implement as soon as possible and in as many places as possible a tried, tested and true prayer for priestly vocations.
Don’t drift on the tide.
Chart your course.
ASK FOR THINGS.
To this end, I was delighted today to receive images of a sheet of prayers for after Mass implemented in a parish.
In their next printing, I hope they will make the language style more uniform (and use the “thees and thous” throughout). That said, I strongly applaud the priest at that parish for being wise and forward-thinking.
We have to think about the long term. We need priests – many more priests – with heart and pluck. We must bring them forth with strong support in prayer and concrete gestures.
We must also get down on our knees and ask the Mother of God and the Holy Archangel to help us in this time of battle for sanity and souls.
¡Hagan lío!
Last Saturday I was in the Diocese of Santa Rosa, in Napa Valley, CA, to speak at a conference.
At one point I had noticed smoke plumes on the far sides of a large Eastern ridge. On Saturday evening the other priest and I headed back to San Francisco in view of flights home at zero-dark-hundred.
Fires swept through the area. In retrospect, people at the conference seemed unaware of the impending threat…. or, I surmise, they would not have been there.
My friend Fr. Keyes, who came to the conference to greet me and listen, wrote:
The next few days after that conference were not fun as the fire started on Sunday night. Don’t plan any trips to the wine country in the near future until we begin to grow again. The devastation is everywhere. Keep us in your prayers.
Another person wrote:
The city of Santa Rosa, and surrounding areas, are currently undergoing several wildfires which have continued unabated since Sunday night. About half of Santa Rosa is now a mandatory evac zone, and the latest was that the fires are 0% contained. Many people are without power, and many have lost their homes and all their belongings. Some folks I know from my parish belong to that number.
If you could remember us in your prayers, and perhaps solicit the prayers of the readership, I know there are many here who would appreciate it.
Thanks, and God bless you.
P.S.: Last I saw, the Marian Sisters were doing shifts of two sisters at a time to help at the cathedral gym, which has been opened for local people who have been evacuated.
Fr. Keyes is the chaplain to the Marian Sisters. They are a marvelous group, a growing community. You might remember photos of how they lay out vestments, with the ribbons of the amice forming images and words. Very creative and dear. For example HERE
The fires seems to have swiftly come upon the people in Santa Rosa. I saw images on the news that are truly frightening: blocks and blocks of houses incinerated, cars burned, flames and smoke still licking their chops.
In your compassion, do pray for these people.
Also, in your prudence, please consider making your own plans for swift evacuation and protect of life and limb of yourselves and loved ones. I harp on this, I know, but I’d rather badger you into doing something as you grumble than read about how you were caught on the wrong foot when something happened to you.
It’s always someone else… until it’s your turn.
And remember to GO TO CONFESSION!
I am usually eager to read anything penned by Anthony Esolen. But when I saw the title of Esolen’s newest offering at Crisis, I put everything aside:
“Open Your Eyes Father Martin”
Father James G. Martin, S.J., is either a cruel or a foolish man. It does not seem to be the first. But if it is not that, it must be the second, because that alone can explain how a Catholic priest can live in the midst of massive and unprecedented family breakdown, and the chaos, loneliness, and alienation consequent upon it, and still wave the banner for the latest innovation in sexual confusion.
He is good at telling stories. Let me tell a few.
[… Hereafter rather hard reading occurs…]
It is a longish piece, and … grim.
I read with extreme delight about the massive Rosary rally in Poland, on 7 October – the anniversary of the Battle of Lepanto and Feast of the Holy Rosary – to ring the entire 2000 mile border of the country in prayers of protection. HERE
[…]
Father Pawel Rytel-Andrianik, a spokesman for the Polish Bishops’ Conference, said it was the second largest prayer event in Europe after the 2016 World Youth Day. The New York Times reported, however, that final participation numbers were still being tabulated.
Airport chapels, considered gateways to the country, were prayer sites for Catholics as well, the AP said, and Polish soldiers stationed in Afghanistan prayed at Bagram Airfield there.
The prayer positions for the rosary event also included fishing boats at sea as well as kayaks and sailboats forming chains on Polish rivers, according to a report from Agence France-Presse.
“During the prayer, I was at the Chopin airport in Warsaw,” Father Rytel-Andrianik said, “and there were so many people that they were pouring out of the chapel.”
“This was an initiative started by lay people, which makes it even more extraordinary,” he continued. “Millions of people prayed the rosary together. This exceeded the boldest expectations of the organizers.”
Churches taking part kicked the prayer event off with a talk and celebration of Mass before Catholics headed to the border to pray the rosary.
[…]
And then there is this:
Villanova University theologian Massimo [“Beans”] Faggioli used Twitter to criticize what he termed using the rosary from “anti-immigrant use.”
“Using the Virgin Mary as a human shield and the Rosary as a weapon against Islam is not exactly my kind of thing,” he tweeted, and, “using the Rosary as a weapon against Islam is not ‘the Catholic Church.’”
Hmmm…
“using the Rosary as a weapon against Islam is not ‘the Catholic Church.’”
Hmmm… poor confused man.
“Using the Virgin Mary as a human shield”
Hmmm….
Hmmm…
May I suggest that the readers here stop and say a Rosary for the awakening to reality of one Massimo Faggioli?
That’s not the sun. That’s the fireball that blew up over Russia.
From SPACEWEATHER:
ASTEROID TO BUZZ EARTH THIS WEEK: When the sun rose over Chelyabinsk, Russia, on Feb. 15, 2013, at first it seemed like an ordinary day. Then the space rock hit. Without warning, the morning sky lit up with a second sun as shock waves shattered windows in hundreds of buildings around the wakening city.
The impactor flew out of the blue, literally from the direction of the sun where no telescope could see it, and took everyone by surprise. Years later, meteorite hunters are still finding pieces of the “Chelyabinsk asteroid” that rained down after its 17m-wide body disintegrated in the atmosphere.
A similar asteroid is approaching Earth this week, but this time NASA knows its coming. 2012 TC4 measures somewhere between 10 m and 30 m wide, and on Oct. 12th it will pass 43,500 km above our planet’s surface, about 1/8th the distance to the Moon. The flyby is so close, Earth’s gravity will significantly alter the asteroid’s trajectory before it exits the Earth-Moon system.
“We know the orbit of 2012 TC4 well enough to be absolutely certain that it won’t hit Earth,” says Paul Chodas, manager of the Center for Near-Earth Object Studies (CNEOS) at JPL,”but we haven’t established its exact path just yet.”
To get a better handle on the asteroid’s orbit (and possible future encounters), an international network of telescopes will monitor 2012 TC4 as it goes by. Pinging the asteroid with its Goldstone radar, NASA hopes to learn much about the space rock’s physical properties. The space agency will even exercise some aspects of its planetary defense systems.
This asteroid is too small to see with the naked eye. However, skilled amateur astronomers using 8+ inch telescopes will be able to observe it. At peak brightness, 2012 TC4 will shine like a 13th magnitude star as it zips through the constellations Capricornus and Sagittarius, according to AstroBob, who has detailed observing tips.
As we approach LutherFest, I’d like to remind you all of a truly informative and engaging book. This collection of essays is helpful.
To give you a sense of the thrust of the book, the Introduction is entitled: “Half a Millennium of Total Depravity (1517-2017): A Critique of Luther’s Impact in the Year of His ‘Catholic’ Apotheosis”.
In other words, this is not an unqualified “RAH! RAH! FOR THE REFORMATION!”
I wish that I had had 30 copies of this, to give to the seminarians and deacons of the diocese back in August. Instead I chose Tracey Rowland’s terrific new book Catholic Theology.
But I digress.
The moderation queue is ON.
I have had some questions about a rumor going around that dramatic changes are going to be imposed on the older, traditional Form of Roman Rite. Someone thinks that the new Lectionary and calendar will be imposed on the 1962 Missale sometime in 2018.
I respond: Piffle. Even, bull piffle!
No. Won’t happen.
In addition, I checked with my various peeps. No. Won’t happen. Can’t happen.
So, you can relax and stop sending me mail about this.
The moderation queue is ON.
The recent Jesuit-run Boston College conference on the reception of Amoris Laetitia in these USA seems to have been intended as a closed workshop on how to “struggle” (in the Cultural Revolution sense) against the Four Olds (in this case, Familiaris Consortio, Veritatis splendor, Humanae vitae, and the Principle of Non-Contradiction). As a confirmation of same, I noted at LifeSite‘s article about it:
The dissident news service National Catholic Reporter (NCR) [aka Fishwrap aka National Schismatic Reporter] appears to have been given the exclusive privilege of covering the conference. Links about the event on Boston College’s website refer to articles on NCR’s website. On its website, NCR states that a “handful of press outlets have been invited to report on the proceedings, including NCR.”
Look at the line up of cadres and commissars who spoke. Look at the Jesuit-run location. Look at the planned and controlled coverage. What could go wrong?
Now we see the lib catholic equivalent of Big Letter Posters from Fishwrap. They have received their caps and booklets. It’ll be a constant harangue now of “Down with the Cow Demons! Down with the Snake Spirits! Down with Dubia Askers!” Soon we will see their version of the Four Pests Campaign rev up against, “Converts who Have Opinions, Lovers of Tradition, Signers of Filial Letters, Upholders of Law”.
Let us go Down To The Countryside of “Lived Experience”.
We must now force the legalist Cow Demons to learn the wisdom of El Pueblo and their “lived experience” which overcomes the Four Olds.
Criticize! RECTIFY!
Then again, how many people attended this workshop?
Here is a photo from Fishwrap of “participants”.
Tens of people!
Perhaps that was just the speakers and organizers.
Wait…. that was the attendance. According to Fishwrap: “These panel presentations were stimulating and prompted an extraordinary amount of discourse among all 40 participants”.
I suppose some will question my choice of imagery.
Get back to me after the Struggle Sessions begin.
I had a note, really a cri de coeur, from a reader who said that she feels as if she and other good and innocent people in the Church today are undergoing one terror attack after another against our Catholic identity, one mass shooting or bus bombing or renegade truck smashing after another.
While I can try to calm and talk people off of ledges, I am not going to say that we are in a good situation right now.
When natural or man made disasters loom or occur, I often post about preparedness. Take steps and make plans while things are relatively calm so that you don’t have to scramble for the basics when the moment comes to ACT.
When spiritual man-made disasters loom or occur, I must now post about preparedness. Take steps and make plans.
What sorts of things might you do?
Of course, make a regular examination of your conscience and GO TO CONFESSION!
That, of course, means that you have to take steps to form your conscience properly. And this is precisely the problem today, when it comes to increasingly frequent attacks on our Catholic identity.
These days there are strong, loud voices shouting down those who teach about the proper role of conscience and the formation of a Catholic conscience and instead are imposing by fiat a dangerous variation of the role of conscience. Moreover, you might be in a parish or a school where you are being subjected to this twisting of conscience.
We must struggle against this oncoming tide and lose not spirit, trust in God, nor TIME. We have to start now.
As part of your spiritual prepping, you need to get your hands on trustworthy sources for your Catholic identity and even form small support and study groups.
One source that everyone can and should have is…
The Catechism of the Catholic Church.
US HERE – UK HERE (There are many editions. Look around.)
I am a huge fan of Kindles (US HERE – UK HERE), but you should also have the BOOK, the material volume which you can hold in your hand and write in. Get the book, which you can flip around in and hold spots in with a couple fingers as you cross check.
Read it. Pick it up. Read portions every day. Form a reading group with other Catholics.
St. John Paul II called the CCC, “a sure reference point”. It is precisely the Magisterium of John Paul that the present days powers are trying to obscure and, eventually, obliterate.
Possession of a copy of the CCC, and a solid familiarity with it, can be both shield and sword in the defense of your Catholic Faith.
Ignorance of the Faith makes you a potential victim of the predations of the libs.
When you hear from the pulpit or some other place a dubious notion that rings an alarm bell, check your CCC. Then you can decide to ask Bp. McButterpants or Fr. Hugalot what gives. “You said X, but the Catechism says Y. [Then, with a smile…] What’s with that?”
Along with the Catechism of the Catholic Church you can review the always dependable Roman Catechism, the The Roman Catechism: The Catechism of the Council of Trent for Parish Priests. Fathers… note the title. Do you have a copy? You should. You should know this stuff like a mathematician knows his tables. It’s basic. And it’s not optional.
US HERE – UK HERE (There are many editions. Look around.)
Also, make use of volumes of the wonderful Baltimore Catechism, which has different volumes for different ages (US HERE – UK HERE). It’s so useful, in its Q&A format. The Catechism of Pius X is also great. (US HERE – UK HERE). There are many good resources available.
However, make sure you have the Catechism of the Catholic Church.
Coat of Arms by D Burkart
A Daily Prayer for Priests
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